Saturday, May 31, 2014

The Tornado of June 2011


photo by Katley Demetria Brown: Devastation on Hancock Street

Toto, I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore. (Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz)

One of the scariest events in nature is the tornado. They seem to pop up out of nowhere, usually during a round of thunderstorms. When a cold front meets a warm front, violent weather ensues and sometimes results in tornadoes. They are prevalent in the Midwest and Southern United States.

They have always been the bane of spring in the Midwest and some parts of the Southeastern United States. My mom had the misfortune to experience the 1998 F4 tornado in Central Florida. She said it was an experience she would never forget.  Fortunately she escaped it unscathed, with minor damage to her house.

Unlike blizzards and hurricanes,  when you get some warning and can take action before the event (board up your windows, pick up a generator, batteries, and flashlights) tornadoes attack suddenly and destroy everything in their path.

Tornadoes were practically unknown in my area until one hit Springfield on June, 1, 2011. That day was hot and humid with severe thunderstorm warnings forecast.  The storms in my area began at about 4 p.m,  and shortly after, a tornado formed in Westfield, Massachusetts.  It made its way east to West Springfield, Springfield, Wilbraham, Palmer and Monson.  It ended somewhere east of  Sturbridge. The tornado was barely a mile and a half north from my house, so it was visible from the back yard, according to one of the neighbors.

(I never got a chance to take a photo of it because my daughter told me to get my ass in the basement...now!) Fortunately, someone with a camera captured the moment.


photo from Wikipedia Commons: "Tornado in Springfield"

I watched the devastation on TV and couldn't believe what I saw. Three people died and 500 became homeless.

The Springfield tornado was one of the worst natural disasters I had witnessed. Although I was fortunate enough to escape it unscathed (no damage to my house or property, no one in my family was injured), barely two miles from me there was devastation everywhere in the form of downed trees, damaged homes, and downed power lines. I remember driving home from work and being rerouted (because of downed trees) into the area affected by the tornado.  It looked like a war zone.  Rubble was everywhere, and people in a total daze gathered as many household goods as they could salvage,and loaded them into cars and vans. The Mass Mutual Center became an emergency shelter.

My neighborhood escaped the damage and we even had electricity.  One of my friends was not so fortunate and had downed trees in her yard.  She and another friend had no electricity for a week.  The elementary school that my children attended years ago took a direct hit.  This photo is of one of the apartment buildings right next to the school, a few days later.


Apartment Building on Hancock Street, by Katley Demetria Brown

The school has now been housed in mobile classrooms and a new building will be built in a another location in the near future.

Most of the damaged areas have been rebuilt, however, nearly three years later, you can see evidence of tornado damage in parts of town.

I wrote a poem about it shortly afterwards. You may or may not believe in a Supreme Being, but to me God is someone who creates and destroys.


Coming at You From a Pissed-off God
Nature is random

If there is a God

he gets bored sometimes and

natural disasters are his playthings.

Fire, flood, tornado and hurricane

are some of the weapons in his arsenal.

ready to be unleashed on unsuspecting people

when they least expect it.

June first was one of those days.

That afternoon God took out his camera

to take flash pictures of Springfield.

He was in one of his cantankerous moods

and decided to turn on the fan

but he got a little more than what he bargained for

when he turned the switch to “high.”.

The funnel cloud he created was

more than just a breeze and it danced

across the landscape toppling bricks and buildings

and hundred year old trees.

Roofs were torn off houses

from the force of the wind.

Debris flew down the streets and rain

drenched the land.

A city mourned its loss of innocence.


You never know when your time is up

It depends what kind of mood God is in that day.

Just don’t piss him off.

By the way, I have another blog, updated weekly, about music and dance from the Balkans, The Alien Diaries. I guarantee you'll enjoy it!


Copyright © 2014 Katley Demetria Brown. Site Designed by Katley Demetria Brown. All Rights Reserved. Photos and poetry © Katley Demetria Brown (with the exception of the photo from Wikipedia Commons.)

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